FX

A short entry for a title that did eventually see release, but was actually intended to be a game with a completely different name and publisher.

Pirates in Hyperspace was Ash and Dave’s first commercial C64 game, published by Alternative Software back in 1987. Before then, the game was being pitched to publishers under the name of “FX”, of which Ashley produced a loading screen that you will all be familiar with.

When recovering Ashley’s disks in 2015, a build of the game in the form of FX was found – complete with the loading screen and also with Mastertronic listed as publisher. Mastertronic no doubt must have rejected the game, Alternative then picked it up and then requested the name change.

It is pretty much the same as the final game, just without music – but an interesting curiosity to check out none the less.